When there aren't any hatches, or it isn't hopper time, that's pretty much my go-to method on Letort, etc. The clear water makes it especially fun. Seeing a monster slide out from a weed bed and wallop your fly - doesn't get much better than that! It seems like they reward you just enough to keep it interesting. I showed this method to a guy on the Letort once who didn't think there were any fish there because he didn't see anything. A 17" brown that materialized out of a the weeds changed his mind.

midgeman wrote:It's a fantastic tactic on spring creeks. And a lot of times you don't see the hit, you FEEL the hit! Sometimes right at your feet. I've been rewarded in the Cumberland Valley Spring creeks with amazing catches on Big Spring, Falling Spring, and the LEEEEEEEE Tort using flipping.

These streams are where I do a lot of my fishing and these undercuts seem to be pretty prevalent. Although the tactic certainly could be used any place a fish is hiding, it is particularly fun when walking along the stream bank.

I've done it with dries and streamers, where there was no way to cast into the lie. I use extreme caution when doing it because it's pretty easy to spook fish by being heavy footed. And I usually hide behind a tree when dapping.

Posted on: 2012/3/5 19:45

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I've found that dapping is an incredibly effective technique in small streams. And for some reason, I'm able to get much closer to the fish than I'd expect that I am able to. Some examples from my day with Swattie on Saturday are here. The first photo he posted of a fish is one that came on a dap; the second photo shows me fishing the head of a pool, but the biggest fish that I saw on that day came from a bugger dropped two feet in front of me under the large rock. The photo attached here is the hole the first brookie came from, with some of my ugly markup.

First, if my memory serves me correctly, Swattie got hung up on a rock near the red spot to the left. He pulled his line out of the way so I could fish the hole. I thought for sure we would move a fish by casting to the head of the pool and dragging the bugger past the exposed root ball (along the orange lines) but that yielded nothing. Next, I thought for sure that we would move a fish under the big rock in the middle of the stream, which had the right side nicely undercut; the blue lines run parallel to it so thats where my next casts were. But that also yielded nothing. Swattie retrieved his fly and moved up to the next hole; I moved up to the green dot on the rock and dapped at the red X (X marks the spot right?). Second dap, a brookie charged out and inhaled the fly. Now you'd think with all that activity, the brookie would be spooked, but apparently not enough to put him down when that peacock herl flashed in his lair

Even small fish like that still spook me, although its almost like calling your shot when playing pool or basketball. There are times that I KNOW that if I drop a bugger right beside a certain rock, there will be a fish under that rock, and its rewarding to at times be right. Other times, I think I'm still right, but have gotten too close and spooked the 'lil fellows..

dapping is just another technique that needs to be in your arsenal. it is often the only way to get a fly into a certain spot. I've done it over numerous log jams where there was no hope of getting any kind of cast in there. and when the fish strikes, ya just gotta yank it right out of the water!

When the need presents itself, I'll do it every time. I call it tule-dipping but that may be an incorrect description. Nothing wrong with it. The object is to catch the fish after all.My favorite form is when you can sneak up close enough to a fish rising just off the bank and hold your rod out with your dry suspended 2 or 3 inches above the water and watch the fish try and catch it in mid air. They have all done this multiple times until caught or spooked.

Squaretail wrote:My favorite form is when you can sneak up close enough to a fish rising just off the bank and hold your rod out with your dry suspended 2 or 3 inches above the water and watch the fish try and catch it in mid air. They have all done this multiple times until caught or spooked.

Using a 13' Tenkara Rod and this method on a creek is almost too easy.

A variant of this is on bigger water when you have large rocks/boulders mid stream. Fishing the other side while standing in the water is just as stealth. My largest fish to date was caught just that way.

Squaretail wrote:When the need presents itself, I'll do it every time. I call it tule-dipping but that may be an incorrect description. Nothing wrong with it. The object is to catch the fish after all.My favorite form is when you can sneak up close enough to a fish rising just off the bank and hold your rod out with your dry suspended 2 or 3 inches above the water and watch the fish try and catch it in mid air. They have all done this multiple times until caught or spooked.

Haha, I had this happen once, but it was not on purpoulus. Fishing a local stream, there was a fish rising on the opposite bank behind a small tree branch. Of course my first cast to him had my Cdc and elk get caught in the branch about a foot off the water. Fish jumped up and grabbed it and could not get off. Had to cross the stream and release the fish from the branch.

Posted on: 2012/3/6 23:49

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wgmiller wrote:Does anyone else "dap" the undercuts of streams and get the sh** scared out of them when a fish bumrushes the fly? While not purist fly fishing, there is something very alluring about dropping a weighted fly alongside the undercuts of a stream and waiting for the strike!